aquarius25
Respected Member
So I had posted a bit of this in my journal but I see this as a huge success and wanted to share it here as well for anyone who might appreciate this. It is a different kind of success but to me it is one of the biggest and most important!
My husband has been in recovery for over 4 yrs. He has full relapsed once and had hundreds of triggers that he has successfully battled through. He has put in some really hard work, endured difficult conversations, and has had many "come to Jesus" moments with himself through this process. He has also managed to work with me and we have both put in the difficult task of rebuilding this marriage into a good one and are going on 17 yrs together. That is not easy to do with this addiction. The real success is in who he is as a father and the impact he has had on our son.
Our son is in that awkward stage of 7th grade and will be a teenager come December. He is really starting to shift from boy to this grown man appearance. It is really great to talk to him and hear his thought and perspective on things. One thing he remarked on recently was my husbands porn addiction. We have chosen to be fairly honest with our kids and they do know about his addiction (not details but more general discussion). If he has a relapse one of the agreements is that he is honest with them as well. This adds a layer of accountability to the family as a whole and was something the kids requested. They want to be part of seeing him healthy and free of this too. They have both commented periodically how he is much more present as a dad now than he was before. Over the weekend my son made another observation and it just really made me so proud of him. He said that he can see how my husband shows appreciation and affection towards me more and he can see how it makes me happy and that makes him happy. He said that some kids at school were talking about pictures of girls (porn) and he said he wasn't interested in that at all. He said he has noticed the impact it has made on his dad and he doesn't want that in his life. He also said that the person his dad is now is the kind of person he wants to be, not the person he was before. I was brought to tears how much he has noticed and watched through these years and I can see how it has impacted his life. I am so proud of the man he is becoming.
Sorry to gush over this but I am just a really proud mama, lol. More so I am a proud wife. My husband still gets triggered from time to time. The relapse was really hard on all of us but, even when I am questioning everything, he is consistent about his recovery. He tried very hard to stay focused on the end goal (a healthy life) and I can see him achieving that more and more every day.
My husband has been in recovery for over 4 yrs. He has full relapsed once and had hundreds of triggers that he has successfully battled through. He has put in some really hard work, endured difficult conversations, and has had many "come to Jesus" moments with himself through this process. He has also managed to work with me and we have both put in the difficult task of rebuilding this marriage into a good one and are going on 17 yrs together. That is not easy to do with this addiction. The real success is in who he is as a father and the impact he has had on our son.
Our son is in that awkward stage of 7th grade and will be a teenager come December. He is really starting to shift from boy to this grown man appearance. It is really great to talk to him and hear his thought and perspective on things. One thing he remarked on recently was my husbands porn addiction. We have chosen to be fairly honest with our kids and they do know about his addiction (not details but more general discussion). If he has a relapse one of the agreements is that he is honest with them as well. This adds a layer of accountability to the family as a whole and was something the kids requested. They want to be part of seeing him healthy and free of this too. They have both commented periodically how he is much more present as a dad now than he was before. Over the weekend my son made another observation and it just really made me so proud of him. He said that he can see how my husband shows appreciation and affection towards me more and he can see how it makes me happy and that makes him happy. He said that some kids at school were talking about pictures of girls (porn) and he said he wasn't interested in that at all. He said he has noticed the impact it has made on his dad and he doesn't want that in his life. He also said that the person his dad is now is the kind of person he wants to be, not the person he was before. I was brought to tears how much he has noticed and watched through these years and I can see how it has impacted his life. I am so proud of the man he is becoming.
Sorry to gush over this but I am just a really proud mama, lol. More so I am a proud wife. My husband still gets triggered from time to time. The relapse was really hard on all of us but, even when I am questioning everything, he is consistent about his recovery. He tried very hard to stay focused on the end goal (a healthy life) and I can see him achieving that more and more every day.
